Development of Cultural Psychology

It has been 12 years since a methodology called “TEM” (Trajectory Equifinality Model) was proposed by Professor Jaan Valsiner (Aalborg University, Denmark), Professor Tatsuya SATO and Associate Professor Yuko YASUDA (College of Comprehensive Psychology, Ritsumeikan University). In 2014, marking its 10th anniversary, the methodology was renamed as TEA, Trajectory Equifinality Approach.

This year, in commemoration of the opening of College of Comprehensive Psychology, the College held the inaugural seminar at Ritsumeikan Osaka Ibaraki Campus (OIC) on July 22, 2016. After the opening remarks from Associate Professor Yasuda, Professor Valsiner gave a lecture titled “Trajectory Equifinality Approach and Cultural Psychology.”

His lecture began with explaining a dot which is abstract. As a single dot, it has no structured context and is a meaningless dot. Then, if some dots stand in line, they still have no meaning. However, if the dots acquire direction, then they have now a meaningful direction toward a specific point crossing a border, i.e. Equifinality Point (EFP) and Bifurcation Point (BFP), then the context gives the frame.
Professor Valsiner notes that the important point is that there is certainly the EFP when someone takes action.

Lecture by Professor Jaan Valsiner

Professor Sergio Salvatore

After the seminar

There were about 80 people, not only researchers but also the first-year students of College of Comprehensive Psychology. All audience were listening to the lecture closely and diligently.
Professor Valsiner concluded that TEA has been growing in the past 12 years and it will be able to grow even more practical and theoretical in the future. As one of the founders of TEA, he expects that Ritsumeikan students at OIC and younger researchers will promote its growth in creative and productive ways.

Book Introduction (scheduled to be published in 2016)

"Making of the Future" is the first English-language coverage of the new methodological perspective in cultural psychology—TEA (Trajectory Equifinality Approach) that was established in 2004 as a collaboration of Japanese and American cultural psychologists. In the decade that follows it has become a guiding approach for cultural psychology all over the world. Its central feature is the reliance on irreversible time as the basis for understanding of cultural phenomena and the consideration of real and imaginary options in human life course as relevant for the construction of personal futures.

The book is expected to be of interest in researchers and practitioners in education, developmental and social psychology, developmental sociology and history. It has extensions for research methodology in the focus on different sampling strategies.